Roasted Eggplant, Mozzarella, and Ziti

Last night, my son and grandson joined my husband and me for dinner. I made baked ziti with eggplant.

The nicest compliment was when my son said the ziti was one of the top five meals I’d ever made. He said he wished it was served in a restaurant so he could get more whenever he wanted. (No need for that, honey; just say when:-)) It was all music to my ears. I’d been working on making a good batch of baked ziti and eggplant for years.

I love roasted eggplant. I was taught by my mother to sweat (salt and drain) eggplant before cooking to rid it of its bitterness. Indeed, for most of my adult life, I have equated the brown liquid that dripped from the colander during sweating as the color of bitterness. The more brown liquid in the sink, the more successful I thought I would be in producing a delicious eggplant dish. But recently I learned the true reason for sweating had nothing to do with bitterness and everything to do with the anatomy of eggplant. Eggplant is porous. It is full of small air pockets that can absorb oil like a sponge when fried. Sweating draws out the water from the cells. The water that is released floods the tiny air pockets essentially eliminating the open spaces that frying oil would otherwise occupy. Since I don’t fry eggplant, this summer I eliminated this extra time-consuming step and went straight to brushing each raw slice of eggplant with olive oil before roasting.

The results have been delightful. At a recent dinner party, guests started gobbling down these unadorned slices of roasted eggplant before I even got to the step of smothering them with marinara sauce and mozzarella. This is why I roast vegetables, you get to taste their essence.

Recently, I went to the Richland Farmers Market in Nashville and bought these gorgeous, violet, svelte, Italian varieties of eggplant (melanzana, in Italian) from the Corner Spring Farm. They had delightful names like Violeta di Toscano, Rosa Blanca, Clara, and Beatrice.

When I got home, I added them to the hefty stash of Black Beauty and Japanese eggplants I had harvested from my garden. I decided to make a day of it and cook all the eggplants at once. When I trimmed and peeled the skin, I was surprised to see the contrast in color of my stash and the Italian varieties. Their flesh was so much whiter. Once roasted, I noticed the Italian varieties were denser and maintained their shape better, too, plus they had the mouth-feel of artichoke hearts. Yum. Now I know why my mother would always pick up an Italian eggplant whenever she saw one in a market; there is a difference. Next summer, I’m planning on growing the Italian varieties.

Yield: serves 8 as main course

Ingredients

The ingredients list is segmented by the cooking steps for the eggplant, marinara sauce, pasta, and basil and cheese layers.

4 or 5 medium-sized eggplants (I didn’t weigh them before cooking, but after cooking I had one pound of eggplant equaling 3 cups)
3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil

Remove the stem, and peel and slice the eggplant. Slice them about one-half inch thick; better to err on the side of thicker than thinner slices.

Pour olive oil in a bowl and brush each side of each slice very lightly with oil. I only used 3 tablespoons of oil for all the eggplants pictured above.

Arrange the eggplant slices on parchment paper-lined baking sheets. Roast for 30-40 minutes. If you want them browned on each side, turn them over after about 20 minutes. I do not bother with this extra step. They should only be lightly browned when done. If you can’t decide if they are cooked enough, try tasting one. That’s what I do. You want them to be firm enough to hold their shape.

At this point, you could store the slices for one or two days in the refrigerator, or freeze. To prep for this recipe, measure out one pound (about 3 cups) and chop into 1.5 to 2 inch segments. Set aside.

While eggplant is roasting, start the marinara sauce. Heat olive oil in a 6-quart frying pan over low heat. Add garlic and sauté for about 2 minutes. Do not allow garlic to brown. Pour the tomatoes into the pan breaking them up with your fingertips as you do. Add salt, cayenne, and sugar. Bring to a boil over high heat stirring frequently. Turn heat down to medium-low and simmer for 15 minutes. Stir in the fresh basil and turn the heat off. Set aside.

While the sauce simmers and the eggplant roasts, start a large pot of salted water over high heat for the ziti. When water comes to a full boil, add the ziti, bring it back to a full boil, stirring frequently, and cook until al dente. Drain the pasta. The pasta will cook more as it bakes.

Now you are ready to layer all the ingredients into a 9 by 13-inch casserole.

Preheat oven to 400º.

Pour two cupfuls of sauce into the bottom of casserole pan.
Add half of pasta, half of eggplant, half of basil, half of mozzarella and one-third of parmesan,

Repeat layering starting with half of the remaining sauce, the rest of the pasta, basil, and mozzarella, and a third of the parmesan. End with the remaining sauce followed by the last of the grated parmesan.

Love this recipe as eggplant is one of my favorite foods, from pickling with vinegar, garlic and oil to battered fried and frozen to have anytime I have the craving. Just take out a few slices, pop it in the toaster oven and either dip in sauce or on Italian bread. Lasagna is excellent too. I watched my Mom salt and sweat the slices too. Decided to test the fruit without that process (got lazy) and found I didn’t need to do it either. Thanks for the Baked Ziti with Eggplant.

Hi, Mary Lou! Well we all had the same teacher, didn’t we?! I loooove eggplant, too. I especially love it as you say, dipped in sauce and placed on a slice of crusty Italian bread. I’m going to start freezing slices after I roast them, as you suggest, especially since I have a lot of Black Beauty eggplants ripening inthe garden right now. You all sure have the corner on great cooks up there in Rochester! Good to hear from you. xoxo